Wage Agreements

asked the First Secretary of State and Secretary of State for Economic Affairs whether he intends to refer the recent wage agreement relating to the plumbing industry in Scotland to the Prices and Incomes Board.

I take it that hon. Members opposite want answers to their Questions. My right hon. Friend is considering, in the light of further information which the Scottish plumbing
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employers have now supplied at his request, whether any investigation by the Board is desirable.

Can the hon. Gentleman get his right hon. Friend to hurry up about this? This award involves a 20 per cent. increase over 12 months. Is it necessary for the right hon. Gentleman, who cannot come here to answer Questions, to spend all this time working out whether this award is inflationary and should be referred to the Board?

My right hon. Friend recently met the Scottish plumbing employers and asked for further information about the earnings and hours of work of Scottish plumbers and the implications of the recent agreement on prices. The federation undertook a special inquiry into the earnings of its members and the results were sent to my right hon. Friend the First Secretary only last week.

asked the First Secretary of State and Secretary of State for Economic Affairs what percentage of wage agreements, measured by the number of workers involved, reached since 1st January, 1965, and what percentage of wage claims currently awaiting settlement, respectively, fall within the limits of the 3 to 3½ per cent. norm for wages and incomes.

The majority of the wage settlements since 1st January, 1965, have been in excess of the 3–3½ per cent. norm. It is not possible to give precise figures because some of the agreements are complex and are, for example, designed to give the greater benefit to lower paid workers. Nor can a useful figure be arrived at in respect of outstanding
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claims, since many do not specify precise amounts but are expressed in general terms.

Is it not rather unsatisfactory that the Department of Economic Affairs should appear to be the only body which is unaware of what is happening to its incomes policy? In view of what is happening to its incomes policy, would the hon. Gentleman suggest to his right hon. Friend that he might try what an injection of a little competition into the economy would do?

We are fully agreed about the necessity to inject a little competition and, as the hon. Gentleman will know, we are strengthening the Monopolies Commission. We are fully aware of what has been taking place with prices and incomes, and we are very concerned about it, but we have only just started such a policy and we have never said that it would be easy to achieve. So far as I know, no previous Government succeeded in carrying out such a policy.

Would my right hon. Friend consider republishing the White Paper on Prices and Incomes Policy in the simplest language possible so that Members of the Opposition can understand the provisions of paragraph 15 dealing with the need to raise the levels of certain industries which are far too low as it is?